To infinity and beyond: Light goes infinitely fast with new on-chip material

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/10/151019122240.htm

Electrons are so 20th century. In the 21st century, photonic devices, which use light to transport large amounts of information quickly, will enhance or even replace the electronic devices that are ubiquitous in our lives today. But there's a step needed before optical connections can be integrated into telecommunications systems and computers: researchers need to make it easier to manipulate light at the nanoscale. Researchers at the Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) have done just that, designing the first on-chip metamaterial with a refractive index of zero, meaning that the phase of light can travel infinitely fast.

Anomalism said:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/10/151019122240.htm

Electrons are so 20th century. In the 21st century, photonic devices, which use light to transport large amounts of information quickly, will enhance or even replace the electronic devices that are ubiquitous in our lives today. But there's a step needed before optical connections can be integrated into telecommunications systems and computers: researchers need to make it easier to manipulate light at the nanoscale. Researchers at the Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) have done just that, designing the first on-chip metamaterial with a refractive index of zero, meaning that the phase of light can travel infinitely fast.

Click to expand...

Oww.... I read the article, and now my brain hertz. Next time, please let us know to have our morning coffee before we read an article like that!

But to go off the obviously deep end for a moment, I've come to wonder if the world might be a brain, each human a neuron, and each communication analogous to the communications between neurons in the brain. These communications were so slow for aeons, but now there are billions of points of light, each communicating with many others...and the step you've just described is the very beginning of the highest possible speed of comms.

Will there be a worldwide "gestalt"? Probably not - just because two items that may be interesting analogous to each other, this does not mean that they are in any way related. But it's nice to think about, maybe even a germ of a story. I think William Gibson explored the possibility once, but I can't remember which book it was.

Well, electricity travels at about 1/100 the speed of light, and fiber optics have been around for some time so using photons to transmit data isn't really new tech.

The newest microprocessors can process data at rates close to 3.5 Ghz, but the speed at which that data can leave the Microprocessor is limited. It's the reason why your Front Side Bus speed is 800Mhz, not the speed of the processor. Data off chip at speeds greater than 1 Ghz turns instantly into RF, and never makes it to the North Bridge chip-set.

So increasing on chip processor speed without improving Bus speed means that you still have a massive bottleneck.

Fenton said:

Well, electricity travels at about 1/100 the speed of light, and fiber optics have been around for some time so using photons to transmit data isn't really new tech.

The newest microprocessors can process data at rates close to 3.5 Ghz, but the speed at which that data can leave the Microprocessor is limited. It's the reason why your Front Side Bus speed is 800Mhz, not the speed of the processor. Data off chip at speeds greater than 1 Ghz turns instantly into RF, and never makes it to the North Bridge chip-set.

So increasing on chip processor speed without improving Bus speed means that you still have a massive bottleneck.

Click to expand...

Of course not. Someone on the Internet that for all we know is a garbage man knows a whole lot more than some Harvard Engineers. You really need to let them know that what they are doing "isn't really new tech."

EnigmaO01 said:

Of course not. Someone on the Internet that for all we know is a garbage man knows a whole lot more than some Harvard Engineers. You really need to let them know that what they are doing "isn't really new tech."

Click to expand...

Obviously you have no clue what they or I'm talking about, or else you would have tried to counter my post instead of wasting bandwidth spamming this thread.

You just couldnt contain that troll instinct you're known for, could you ?

Fenton said:

Obviously you have no clue what they or I'm talking about, or else you would have tried to counter my post instead of wasting bandwidth spamming this thread.

You just couldnt contain that troll instinct you're known for, could you ?

Click to expand...

Oh I've got a clue alright.

You're just another poster that wants to put himself up on a pedestal by pretending to be more knowledgable than university researchers and pooh poohs any topics posted here. And of course we have no idea what your scientific credentials are as you're anonymous.

Having been involved in university grants for research, your contention that their research "isn't really new tech" is assinine. You would know that if you knew how impossible it is to get a grant for something that "isn't really new tech" let alone difficult for other topics.

Fenton said:

Well, electricity travels at about 1/100 the speed of light, and fiber optics have been around for some time so using photons to transmit data isn't really new tech.

The newest microprocessors can process data at rates close to 3.5 Ghz, but the speed at which that data can leave the Microprocessor is limited. It's the reason why your Front Side Bus speed is 800Mhz, not the speed of the processor. Data off chip at speeds greater than 1 Ghz turns instantly into RF, and never makes it to the North Bridge chip-set.

So increasing on chip processor speed without improving Bus speed means that you still have a massive bottleneck.

Click to expand...

Of course, once you replace the antiquated PC from the CPU to the NB with an FO strand you've eliminated that problem.


BTW - I think your CPU speed is a little antiquated, too. OC'ed chips have almost reached 9 GHz and the fastest production chips are running 5+ GHz.

EnigmaO01 said:

Oh I've got a clue alright.

You're just another poster that wants to put himself up on a pedestal by pretending to be more knowledgable than university researchers and pooh poohs any topics posted here. And of course we have no idea what your scientific credentials are as you're anonymous.

Having been involved in university grants for research, your contention that their research "isn't really new tech" is assinine. You would know that if you knew how impossible it is to get a grant for something that "isn't really new tech" let alone difficult for other topics.

Click to expand...

If you " have a clue " then you should be able to counter what I said instead of just spamming the threa.

And I didnt say their research wasn't new. I said we have been using light as a medium to transfer digital data for some time now and there are limitations or " bottlenecks ".

MoSurveyor said:

Of course, once you replace the antiquated PC from the CPU to the NB with an FO strand you've eliminated that problem.


BTW - I think your CPU speed is a little antiquated, too. OC'ed chips have almost reached 9 GHz and the fastest production chips are running 5+ GHz.

Click to expand...

Yea, I built a gaming computer a few years ago and it has a 3.2 Ghz processor.

Figured they had faster CPUs out there.

Fenton said:

Yea, I built a gaming computer a few years ago and it has a 3.2 Ghz processor.

Figured they had faster CPUs out there.

Click to expand...

Even in 2007 I had an OC'ed quad chip doing 4.2 GHz and I was far, far from the fastest. The 8+ GHz OC'ed speed was broken years ago (2011??), 7+ GHz broken a decade ago.

MoSurveyor said:

Even in 2007 I had an OC'ed quad chip doing 4.2 GHz and I was far, far from the fastest. The 8+ GHz OC'ed speed was broken years ago (2011??), 7+ GHz broken a decade ago.

Click to expand...

Yup, my old Comp needs a upgrade. But I still can run any game at max video settings without losing frame rate.

Looking forward to the new Star Wars Battlefront !

I think the next big deal is going to be 4k monitors and graphics cards.

Fenton said:

Yup, my old Comp needs a upgrade. But I still can run any game at max video settings without losing frame rate.

Looking forward to the new Star Wars Battlefront !

I think the next big deal is going to be 4k monitors and graphics cards.

Click to expand...

Fx 8350 Overclocked to 5.2 ghz, gtx 970, 32 gb of ram.. I'm set for awhile.

David_N said:

Fx 8350 Overclocked to 5.2 ghz, gtx 970, 32 gb of ram.. I'm set for awhile.

Click to expand...

Nice ! Is that thing water cooled or what ??